About Me

If I can just give to the world more than I take from it, I will be a very happy man. For there is no greater joy in life than to give.
Motto : Live, Laugh and Love.
You can follow me on Twitter too . My handle is @Raja_Sw.

Saturday, March 11, 2017

T20 is
the flavor of cricket today. Test cricket is “too slow” for these busy times.

(Typical
conversation:

This goes on for the WHOLE day?

No, not
one. Five.
Five? Five full days?

Yes. And
even after that, it could be a draw. No winner or loser.

You want
to kill me? Kill me NOW.)

News too
has imbibed this supreme sense of urgency, an outcome of this instant
gratification urge. Every outlet, in its rush to be “the first” to break the
story, is happy to just push it out there, not fact-checked, unedited. As long
as it is “the first”. People’s attention
span probably ensures they’ll just
skim through it anyway – assuming they go past the headline first. And news comes at them at such a rapid pace anyway, they’ll forget this piece the moment
the next one appears in their inbox, or is delivered on social media.

That’s
the world we live in today. And that’s ok – these are fast-paced times.

But this
also means we sometimes miss the essence of something significant because we
are too caught up in our instant gratification trip. It’s not happening fast
enough for our minds to appreciate any movement at all. So we conclude, nothing
is happening . But it’s happening in ITS time, not ours. Something we will
appreciate only if we give it ITS time.

Ok, let
me stop talking in this Deepak Chopra-esque lingo and come straight to the
point.

I am
referring to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and its evolution.

When the
results of the Punjab Assembly elections were announced today, there was a huge
sense of disappointment amongst AAP
supporters. Many of them had worked incredibly hard for the party, giving it their everything. They'd even guarded EVMs, fearing they might be manipulated during the 5-week waiting period between voting and counting.

AAP came
in with "just" 20 seats out of 117. This, when at one time, a few months ago,
they were talking of 80+ seats, even 100 seats!

That’s
quite a comedown!

The
incumbent, the Akalis, did even worse. Expectations from them were very low
anyway, so they probably matched, or even surpassed, these low expectations.

The
runaway winner was the old hand, the Congress Party. Thanks to a leader the
electorate largely trusted, Capt Amarinder Singh. And of course, the
organization at ground level that this grand old party has.

So AAP
ended up a very distant second. But, even so, having come in second, it is the
main opposition party in the Punjab Assembly.

This
made me think.

Was I
expecting AAP to sweep Punjab? Not really. I certainly expected them to do much
better than they did, but I never once underestimated the other two big parties.

Both Congress and the Akalis are entrenched
parties, with cadres loyal to them. They’ve both fought many elections before
and are surely aware of the tricks of the trade, especially how to woo the
electorate. Both are deep-pocketed and can comfortably call upon resources from
outside Punjab whenever required.

Compare
this with AAP. It’s a 4-and-a-little-something year old party, with very little
experience of contesting elections. Although it did contest general elections
in Punjab in 2014, this was the first time it was seeking votes from Punjab
voters to govern them in their own state.

AAP’s
footprint, at least that which could have been relevant to the Punjab voter,
was almost entirely in Delhi. It might claim to have a good report card to show
for its two years in Delhi – but it was still a relatively unknown commodity
for the Punjab voter. Many of the AAP candidates must have been new
names for the voters.

Compare
this with the Congress and SAD. In 2012, Congress got about 40% of the voteshare, even more than SAD's 35%, though SAD won the elections. So this time even if there was huge anti-incumbency in Punjab, wouldn't it be natural to expect these anti-incumbency votes to go to a party that is already extremely well-entrenched in the state? That has a very strong local leader in Capt Amarinder? Why would a voter pick an untested name from an untested party over a
familiar, trusted, one?

On what
basis then were the predictions of 80-100 seats for AAP based?

Based purely on euphoria from seeing crowds
at campaigns held well before election date?

At least if these crowds had
assembled just a few days before election date, one could have made a case for
AAP having a realistic chance of winning.

There
were probably many reasons for AAP’s less-than-expected performance. I
don’t want to dwell on them here.

I do want to however dwell on the expectation
itself. That's because I strongly believe the disappointment stems from this expectation.

Otherwise, getting 20 seats in a state you're contesting for the first time, against two formidable opponents would normally be considered a victory for a new party.

I think
it all started with the Delhi landslide.

67/70 is
mind-blowingly phenomenal by any standards.

But it
is also ripe for the creation of illusions.

Had AAP
won Delhi with a more modest 40/70, nobody would've been throwing numbers
like 100/117 in Punjab. That is an obscene domination, but when you’ve seen
67/70, a 100/117 looks, well, doable.

Which,
for the party itself, is just fine. You contest to win. And to win every seat
you contest.

But when
the “new normal” being talked about becomes 80/117 or even more, you’re just
setting yourself up for disappointment.

After
all, Delhi is history, Punjab is a fresh election. You need to start from
scratch to win over every single voter all over again. One vote at a time,
building up to one seat at a time, building up to a majority. It is a
painstaking process, requiring huge amount of investment of time and money. Unlike other deep-pocketed parties, AAP
largely depends on volunteers for both their time and money. It was going to be a real tough ask to
harness these resources for 117 constituencies.

Seen
this way, AAP should have been an underdog to start with. That it wasn’t, is
down entirely to unrealistic expectations, whether created by the party itself
or by others.

Also
seen from this bottom-up angle, that AAP has managed to get 20 seats,
contesting for the first time in Punjab state elections, should be seen as positive by the neutral observer.
Until now, Punjab had seen mostly a bi-party contest. This time, a third party
entered the fray – and ended up being the main opposition party in the
Assembly.

This
might serve as a good experience for AAP in Punjab. By the time the next state
elections come along, AAP might have settled in better in the state, and broadened its base. This is part of the
evolution process of a political party.

Which
brings me to the evolution of AAP, as whole.

And
brings me back to the point I started this piece with. On these fast-paced
times and the concomitant lack of patience to allow things to evolve.

Sometimes
it’s hard to believe that AAP is not even 5 years old. Compare this with
entrenched parties, who’ve been around for decades, with strong organization
structure and cadres around the country. AAP is nowhere close to this at the
moment.

Yet, the
buzz is all about where AAP is going to contest next, and how it is going to
“shake” the biggies in that state. Gujarat next? Then what?

Much as
I appreciate the excitement that seems to follow any AAP indication, or even
speculation, of contesting elections, I
think we need to temper our electoral expectations on AAP. Enough of this hype. It’s not like other parties are sleeping and
are just going to let AAP walk all over them.

Yes, by
all means, AAP should contest every election it wishes to, if it has the resources to do so. Even if it wins one seat (or, as in the case of
Goa, not even that one), it might be a first step to making its presence known
in that state. It might have a small vote share which might not translate to
seats, but is an encouraging vote of confidence from those few voters.

But, for
heaven’s sake, keep the hype down. Put in all the effort to win – but don’t
go about making statements like “we’re going to sweep it”. Your volunteers
might need pumping up, but there are better ways of motivating them.

Otherwise you set yourself up for situations like today. What
should be seen as a victory of sorts in Punjab – becoming the second largest
party, and therefore the main opposition party – now feels like a defeat.

All
because of hype and unrealistic expectations.

AAP is
still evolving. It’s still very early days for it – we don’t know how its
footprint will be 5 years from today, 10 years from today. It might have a
significant presence in many states by then. It might be in government in a
few, maybe the main opposition party in others. Especially given the state of
the Congress party at the moment, AAP might become the biggest national party
after the BJP.

Or it
might not. Already, based on just today’s results, some have written the
obituary of the party. Somewhat reminiscent of what happened after the LS
elections of 2014.

All of
this is, of course, in the realm of speculation.

What AAP
can do is keep doing its job, and building credibility as a party. This might
not win it elections in the short run,
since it is still very much an outsider, fighting for mind space against
entrenched parties with established cadres and networks.

But as
it gains credibility, as its work gets talked about more, as it builds more
institutional strength and capability, it has every reason to hope for more
electoral gains too. This might take
time but if it is on the right track, it should eventually see results for all
its good work.

In
between, there will, of course, be electoral hits and misses. These just need to
be taken in its stride, without getting carried away - or agitated - about a hit
or a miss. After all, an electoral result is not an absolute reflection of one
party, it is relative to how voters perceive others in the fray.

So my
advice to AAP would be, just be grounded. And patient. It might be frustrating at times, but play it like a Test match.
Build the capabilities that enable you to be that “lambe race ka ghoda”. Where you’re in government, let your work
speak for you. Where you’re in opposition, be a tough opposition, demanding
performance from the government. Either way, the winner will be the people of that state or constituency.

3 comments:

Great piece. I agree mostly but I think one of the reasons to make these tall claims is to convince the electorate that you are capable of forming the government. One of the biggest hesitations people have in voting for a new party is that they will not form the government so it will be a wasted vote.

So that's why it becomes important for a new party to project itself as a viable alternative.

Its OK to temper down expectations but it is indeed surprising that vote share hasn't increased substantially since LS2014. Also, ground support just before election seemed disproportionate to the vote share that AAP eventually got. https://t.co/uR9PEfNjh3